Food & drink businesses for sale in the UK

Buying a food and drink business carries some sector-specific risks that do not appear in most other sectors. Work through these before you commit.

The kitchen and the EHO record

Get the most recent Environmental Health Officer (EHO) report and the food hygiene rating sticker. Ratings below 4 should be explained and the underlying remediation work understood before you agree a price. Walk the kitchen yourself, look at the fridges and freezers, check the temperature logs, and ask how often deep cleans happen.

Licences and consents

Premises licence (alcohol), late-night refreshment, music and entertainment, any pavement-licence permissions, and the personal licence of the designated premises supervisor (DPS). All can transfer, but the timing and paperwork matter. The DPS especially: if the current DPS is leaving with the seller, you or a staff member need to be ready to take over on day one.

Staff and turnover

Hospitality runs on a tight labour market. Ask for staff turnover figures, hourly rates, current rota structure, and whether key chefs or front-of-house leads are likely to stay through the handover. A good business with a kitchen team walking out the door becomes a much harder business overnight.

Lease, hours, and trading restrictions

Get the lease and check: years remaining, rent review schedule, repairing obligations, and any restrictive covenants (no music after a certain hour, no outdoor seating, no deliveries before a certain time). For food and drink especially, restrictive covenants can quietly cap your turnover.

A few hospitality-specific extras

• Mix of wet sales (drinks) versus dry sales (food) and gross margin on each
• Reliance on third-party delivery platforms (Deliveroo, Uber Eats, Just Eat) and the commission you pay them
• Seasonality and how much of annual profit comes from a few peak weeks
• Any concentration risk in private hire, events, or corporate bookings

Food and drink businesses change hands using slightly different yardsticks depending on size and category.

SDE and EBITDA multiples

For owner-operated cafes, takeaways, and small restaurants typically under £500k revenue, a multiple of Sellers Discretionary Earnings (SDE) is the standard. Typical SDE multiples sit between 1.5x and 2.5x, with the spread reflecting:

• Lower end (1.5x-2x): short lease, declining trade, heavy owner reliance, single delivery-platform concentration, weak EHO history.
• Upper end (2x-2.5x): long secure lease, 3+ years of stable or growing covers, strong online reviews, documented systems, owner not in the kitchen full time.

For larger operations (multi-site, gastropubs, restaurants above £750k revenue), adjusted EBITDA is the more common base. Multiples in the 3x to 5x range are typical, with successful established gastropubs and restaurant groups sometimes pushing higher.

Stock and freehold

Stock of food, drink, and consumables is valued at completion at cost or independently verified market value, separately from the headline asking price. Where the business comes with a freehold pub or restaurant building, the property value is normally quoted separately and may sell as a single package or as separate transactions.

Rules of thumb you will see

For pubs and bars, you will often see industry rules of thumb based on barrelage, beer volume, or fair maintainable trade. These are useful as a sanity check but should be cross-referenced against SDE or EBITDA. If a pub is being marketed at a barrelage-based valuation that is significantly higher than the SDE multiple would support, the gap needs explaining before you offer.